Day 5 - Jackson Hole

Day 5: B, J and I were heading home. Spent the morning packing up and trying to restuff everything back in suitcase that clearly had shrunk. Only thing I purchased was a new pair of jeans. Anyway, got everything back in, got loaded up, and headed to airport with quick detour through town to pick up moose t-shirts for the boys. Returned rental car, checked in, held breath while bags were weighed (hooray, underweight), patiently waited in the slowest security line ever with apparantely people who have NEVER traveled before, got on our delayed plane. Made our connection in Salt Lake by the skin of our teeth. Passed by B sitting up in first class with his cocktail on our way to the low rent seats in the back, and headed back to RDU. Home safe and sound around 1am. Picked up boys from the beach next day and we were all back together.
Hole Pack - had a GREAT time in JH! Cheers to great friends and a great time!

Feeling HOT HOT HOT!

Feeling HOT HOT HOT HOT...This is a song I am supposed to hum while sipping pina coladas on a white sand beach with the teal green surf lapping at my toes while a waiter quietly lowers the drink flag I raised only 2 minutes ago as he slips an ice rimmed beverage into my hand. Instead, I am singing this song as I stagger around my hot house with sweat dripping down - well, everywhere - and my children look like they have run through a sprinkler even though they haven't left the house and have been nowhere near water the the exception of the supervised hand washing. OUR AIR IS OUT! It's 97 degrees outside! People die in these kinds of conditions! Oh the horrors of it. So much for looking fresh. The only thing I have a hope to be fresh is my breath after a brushing with some Crest. But who cares because no one can get close enough to smell my breath since my clinical strength Secret can't even keep up. Anyway, thankfully just in time before the hallucinations stage sets in, help is on the way. Our A/C guy is going to rescue us. Of course, we could do without the piece of paper with dollars signs and numbers too far from the little decibel that comes with this saving, but at this point we are just thrilled A/C is coming soon! Wednesday!!! Hurrah! If the new A/C is NOT IN by some silly technicality by WEDNESDAY, I'm sure you'll read about us in the papers and see our pictures on the evening news. Just get your wallets out and please bail us out. We weren't in our right minds. By the way, air conditioning was invented in 1906 by a man named Carrier (some of you might have a Carrier). If you need to know anything about SEER numbers, Trane's, or Trains, just let me know. I may just be an expert. ; )

Is my child really playing a DS?

Okay...so, like most parents who wish away babyhood, and then are sad when that wish seems to have come true...that's the "ah-ha" moment I had today. Amazing how mother nature can erase those early hospital homecoming sleep deprived horror months like they almost didn't happen. When you're in the midst of it all, having your fingernails plucked out one at a time with no pain killers, seems almost humane...and preferable to the endless crying, demanding, wailing, frustrating, wine-drinking-even-though-you're-nursing, moments that seemed to go on and on and on and on. And then one day, you find, that what used to be your baby, is now some kid playing Nintendo DS and connecting with his cousins in a lego rendition of Star Wars complete with light sabers and R2D2. What's next? I feel like I'm on a white water rafting ride that just hit the level 5 rapids. Whoooooooosh! Down I go straight towards teenager-dome and out-of-the-house-dome. Oh the horrors of it all! Okay...calm down...drink some wine...and go in and check out the sleeping little 4 year old that fell asleep "playing" the DS who can only enter world One and jump around in there a bit. Sure he can get the light sabre out and hack away at a Darth Vadar made of linking animated blocks, but he's not really "playing" it. In fact, he's now traded it in for his coveted "v" blankie that is worn so thin it could be mistaken for an ancient pre-civil war hanky, but means much more to him than a small red box with blinking lights...At least for now...Sweet dreams...holding on to babyhood just a fraction longer.

Abducted by Aliens...but back home now.

Put down your pitchforks!!! I know...I know...I have totally missed days of blogging. Like your favorite TV drama when writers go on strike, it is the biggest downer when the next episode fails to emerge. And I was on such daily roll... Oh, well, I do have a good excuse. I was abducted by aliens. Little ones. It's all a little hazy. There were two of them. One was smaller and spoke an interesting language that must have a base in English because every once in a while I understood a word interwoven through the babble. The little one had crazy hair and had an awful stench. The bigger one was quiet (or maybe that just seemed the case compared to the little one who was SO loud.) They carried me away and took up so much of my time it was just impossible to get to the computer! I'm still trying to figure out why they insist on calling me "mama" and why they are still here. I do like them though. They're kind of cute! I did snap off a picture of the little one so you can all see! I was safely on the other side of the fence so he couldn't get me.

If you have to get up early...coffee would be nice!

Day 4. Yes, I am writing every day. It's like getting a new toy. The novelty is still brand spankin' new, so expect posts from me daily (when I can) for at least a week of two anyway. I was starting to worry that nothing super blog-worthy happened to me today. And then I realized, I woke up and blessed this world with my presence. Okay, I didn't actually wake up. In fact, its very rare that I "wake up". It goes more like this...I was woken up at 6AM sharp by a little pair of eyes about 2 inches from mine saying "mommy? Wanna go play?" Are you kidding me? The only thing I wanna go play is "sleep marathon" or "lets see how long mommy can keep her eyes closed". Apparently they don't teach those games in pre-school... So, I tried the 'ole why don't you climb in bed with me parent trap and rest for a few minutes. How is it a 4 year old can fidget and twist around in a bed like there were mousetraps going off under the covers. Finally, after getting kicked and head-butted one too many times, I rolled out of the bed to start the day. I think I'm going to teach the 4 year old to make coffee. That way, when I get the "mommy, wanna play" before the sun rises (and believe me - its almost the summer equinox - that bright orb is rising early) I can at least smile and nod as I levitate towards the aroma of fresh brewed coffee. mmmmmmm... cheers.

WARNING! Don't order the Large Combo with Sex and the City!

Day 3. Okay, I am officially getting warmed up. So, tonight a friend and I went to see Sex and the City. We met up at the bar for a sophisticated meal of sushi and cosmos pre-flick looking smart in our Minolo Blahniks, Sevens, and Geborniys. That last one is a puzzle for all you fashionistas out there. Okay, so we really did have sushi and cosmos which is super high society in an area known more for its fried chicken and bar-b-que. So, that was fun. Then we goto the theatre. I suggested the medium combo which includes a half barrel of greasy, butter soaked popcorn, a two litre size drink, and a choice of overpriced candy. However, upon studying the prices, my friend quickly noted the LARGE combo was only a dollar more so we should certainly triple our calories since we will be sitting dormant for the next two hours and then going to bed. I couldn't agree more! Financially it just made sense! So, we order our LARGE combo, gather up our 20,000 calorie snack, and head to the condiment station where we added a little salt, grabbed two wrapped straws (don't ever grab the loose straws if you can help it), and napkins.

Now, as a sidebar, my friend is a Sagittarius. I am a Gemini. My husband is a Sag, and her husband is Gem. We joke when its not a gender issue, we can usually chalk it up to the stars as far as bizarre behavior. So, when we get to the napkins, I told her I already got some. She took a look at the conservative wad in my hand and immediately grabbed more. J always thinks I skimp on napkins at the movies, and I fret over the amount of paper one can pull out of those black boxes. Kind of funny. (This comes into play later...) So, off to screen #10 we go.

Partway into the movie (and this is not a spoiler) Miranda discloses it had been 6 months since she's had sex with her husband. My friend, we'll call her "Carolyn" jumped in her seat and let out a loud yelp! (I think she forgot the rest of us were in there with her for a minute...) It was so loud! We started giggling like little schoolgirls. Next, I underestimated the width of my LARGE coke and tried to palm it like a basketball. I got the cup up just past the safety of the cup holder rim when the lid popped off and the cup started to buckle along with lots of sweet, sticky liquid and some noise making ice cubes. Kersplash! At least it only got the side of my chair and some on my leg. I took my now embarrassingly small stack of napkins and cleaned myself up as best I could all the while envying the pile of clean, white napkins "Carolyn" had laid all across her pretty white pants. I held my soaking wad in my hand the rest of the movie as it was all I had. We giggled some more about my mishap. Then, next thing you know, not even 10 minutes later, "Carolyn" made the same Large combo rookie mistake. She tried to palm her coke. She made it farther past the cup rim when I heard KKERRRSPLASH! The entire coke spilled. Now, one of the only very serious, quiet parts of the movie is going on and "Carolyn" and I are in hysterics. I could hardly see the movie through my tears and if it were a deep, thought-provoking film, I surely would have been lost. Now, we had a dilemma. When the movie is over, do we high-tail it out of there before anyone sees how bad we've destroyed our area? Or do we sit and wait for the lights to come on so we avoid any potential injury from wet floors? We waited for the lights...and when they came on OH MY the river of coke. We had to go out our row the long way to avoid the puddles. I try to pick up all my garbage when I leave my seat, so I turned to grab my coke which was about 1/3 full. I amateurishly tried to palm my beverage again and when the top popped off in the cup holder, I was like forget it! So, my apologies for those who had to clean up after us but I'm sure they've seen much worse. So, my lesson for today...don't be a pig and order the large combo. Save the dollar and the dry cleaning bill for something else!

Foot is healing just fine...thanks to some Red Wine

Okay, so its my second day as an official blogger. My little site doesn't look as cool as some others (hhhmmmmm....you know who you are walker off''er), but hey, give me a few more posts and I will rock this thing! Okay, so I am back to life as we know it. One thing I am pretty pissed off about is the fact that I can't swim. Well, I CAN swim, (not drowning counts right?), but I had this foot surgery - by the worlds best surgeon - on my birthday last week to remove some glass...I was at one of my best friends beach house where mysteriously a vodka bottle was dropped and the only piece of glass not sucked up by the "claimed" vacuum found its way deep into my foot. The first attempt to remove the glass included an office visit to above-mentioned surgeon, where 100 shots of some stinging liquid was fired into the ball of my foot. Yeee-ouch! After digging around for what felt like four hours (probably really only about 15 minutes) I was told the quickest way to rid myself of the filthy sharp funk was a real operation. Scrubs, hair bonnets, narcotics and all! So, on my birthday I got to hang out in a cute little buttless gown and read my book while I awaited my time in the sterile operating environment. Long story short, all went well. I read 100 pages of my new book (Riding Lessons - kind of scary if you're an eventer) and had a great nap. Added bonus, I got the glass out of my foot! Happy, happy feet! Still a little sore, but every day is better.

Okay, so I totally opted to not allow comments due to a prior youtube a-hole who commented that my darling dancing children sucked. Total stranger and who asked him anyway? So, I may allow comments on my blog, but just know, I crumble with criticism, so if you don't have anything nice to say, just don't say anything at all...or lie!

BTW - tried a great new wine tonight - called "Red Knot" Cab - out of Australia I think...yummy~!